VII

ULCISCOR UTTERS A CURSE AND stumbles back as the rain-streaked glass in front of him shatters. Blazing, orange heat roars inside. I’m flinching to my feet, unsteady against our shuddering descent, though I’m not sure what I can do. The Transvect is still moving fast enough that the flames look like they’re pouring off the timber, flattened by the momentum. Flowing toward us.

“Maybe more than a while!” shouts Ulciscor over the thundering hiss of rain and shrieking of wind as it pounds through the carriage. His eyes have gone completely black as he moves, much more smoothly this time, away from the flames and over to a large window farther along. He peers through, down at the storm-shrouded forest rushing past.

“Are we under attack?” I raise my voice as well, an arm up to shield against the heat and light as I reel my way over to him. That was an explosion. No suggestion of a simple fault now.

The Transvect has slowed enough that the trees below are passing at a less dizzying rate, though still considerably faster than I’d like. The tallest ones are edging closer. Shadows from the blaze in front of us create deranged, flickering orange-and-black motion in the nearest foliage as we hurtle past.

I’m on the edge of panic, but I’ve been there a lot over the past few years. I know how to control myself through it.

“Does it matter?” Ulciscor is disconcertingly unaffected by either the cacophony or the roasting heat creeping toward us. He strides—impossibly balanced, compared to my desperate clinging to the seat next to me—to the very back of our section, then crouches, peeling back one of the thick rugs.

“What are you doing?”

“A friend of mine used to imbue Transvects. Every section should have… ah!” He’s triumphant as he grips something beneath the rug and twists. The grinding’s audible even above the assault of the shrieking wind, and suddenly there’s a square about three feet in diameter missing in the floor.

“Access hatch,” explains Ulciscor calmly as he straightens.

“To where?”

Ulciscor replies by taking two long steps across and grabbing me by my bad shoulder, spinning me roughly. I don’t have time to react to the pain before the window to my left shatters and glittering, orange-flecked splinters arrow past as Ulciscor shields me with his body. Fresh, icy wind whips us, a counterpoint to the encroaching inferno.

Ulciscor doesn’t seem to be injured, holding me in place as effortlessly as he would an infant. “There’s a platform underneath. Stone above and below. We can shelter there without you being burned alive.” His midnight eyes reflect my terrified visage back at me.

I feel my teeth bare in resistance to the concept, but the heat pressing at my back is too compelling an argument. Ulciscor goes first, dropping through the opening as easily and lightly as if he did it all the time, landing so that his head is still visible above the floor. He motions for me to follow, then ducks down and out of sight.

I lurch to the edge of the hatch, the icy air shrieking through it threatening my balance almost as much as the quivering of the Transvect itself.

I’m not enthused by what I see when I look downward. Ulciscor, it turns out, exaggerated when he described the section below. It’s a stone pillar about two feet wide, and from my position, I can see flame-lit treetops on either side of it. It’s not a platform.

“This is not a platform!” I yell, unable to contain a slightly hysterical note.

There’s no response, and the crash of more glass behind me gives me little choice. I perch on the edge before awkwardly sliding through, injured shoulder creaking, stone scraping against skin through my tunic. There’s a surge of panic when my feet dangle what feels like too far down, but then Ulciscor’s steadying me with that impossibly iron grip, lifting me the rest of the way as if I weighed nothing. I’m shorter than he is, barely able to see back into the cabin. What I can make out is already bathed in fire.

“Duck.”

I obey the command; a moment later the stone hatch is sliding back into place, sealing away the inferno. Ulciscor’s still holding me with one hand, but I clutch a rain-slicked beam with manic determination anyway. The treetops are less than twenty feet below us now, flickering past, still disappearing into the darkness far too fast. The wind howls, rips at me, trying to tear me from my perch. Stray droplets of rain sneak their way underneath the Transvect somehow, stinging at exposed skin. Above us, the conflagration continues to thunder around the cracking of wood.

It hasn’t been thirty seconds since the explosion.

Ulciscor tightens his grip on my arm, dragging my attention to him. “When the Transvect is about to hit the trees,” he yells calmly, “we jump.”

“What?” I try unsuccessfully to shy back, stopped by his vise-like hand.

Ulciscor’s attention has returned to the blurred treetops below, which whip in the storm. This is an old forest; those trees are a hundred and fifty feet tall, maybe more. “Get ready.”

“No. I don’t think so. Not a chance.” It comes out as a mutter. I still can’t extricate myself from the Quintus’s grasp.

If Ulciscor hears, he doesn’t bother to respond. Instead, he turns and wraps me in an embrace that I’m powerless to resist. Lifts me off my feet.

“Here we go,” he yells in my ear.

He leaps and twists, facing his back in the direction we’re hurtling.

My stomach lurches. I think I shout, or try to, but there’s a screeching from behind us, a rending that fills the night and covers any sound I might make. I have the impression of the flaming Transvect plunging on without us, a pyre against the thunderclouds. Then branches rushing up, snapping and tearing. There’s a sickening lurch as we glance to the side off a tree trunk. Ulciscor’s grasp never wavers.

We hit the ground.

Air explodes from my lungs as we bounce and roll and skid to a stop in the damp; I gasp, cough, flail weakly against Ulciscor’s grip. It’s instinct, panic. I know he’s taken the brunt of the impact. Saved my life. Somewhere ahead of us there’s a blast of sound, a thundering reverberation that crashes over us and through the trees beyond. Ulciscor’s embrace finally slackens and I roll away, just in time to see a hellish glow vanishing behind thick foliage and sleet.

“Ulciscor.” I’m still on the ground as I turn back to him. Fear the worst when I realise he hasn’t made a sound yet.

Sudden movement and a pained growl make me start. I crawl over, putting a hand on the prone man’s shoulder. “Are you alright?”

“What do you think?” Ulciscor groans and rolls over, glaring up at me. His eyes are still flooded with darkness. Despite his grumbling, he doesn’t seem to be favouring any particular injuries.

I stagger to my feet. Badly bruised, shaken, still winded. But able to move everything. The wind and rain are not as bad down here, the leafy canopy providing some protection. I offer Ulciscor my right hand, and he pulls himself up with another groan, which I echo at the strain. “What was that?”

“Will shell, I think. Easy to make. Must have been hidden in the section ahead of us.” He massages a leg, wincing.

I recall the term. The Catenan legions used them decades ago, before Birthright was extended to foreign combatants. “What do we do now?”

The big man tests each limb gingerly. “We get back to the Transvect.”

“Is there any point?”

“If the core lift and propulsion mechanisms are undamaged, then there are some simple override levers in the front cabin. I can use those to get us moving again.”

“And if they’re damaged?”

“Then we’re walking a little farther.”

I grunt. Easy for the Quintus to say. We have no food or water. And we’ve been travelling into Tensia’s vast northern wildlands for at least a half hour, moving incredibly fast. It won’t be a short hike back to civilisation.

Ulciscor ignores my lack of enthusiasm, gripping my shoulder. Half to steady me, half for himself. He’s hurting more than he lets on, I think. “Come on. And keep quiet. That explosion only did enough to bring the Transvect down, not destroy it.”

“You think someone wanted it intact?” I’m dubious.

“Well. Not intact, I suppose. But we’ve been close to starving out the Anguis down here, and there was certainly plenty of grain on board. On the other hand, it could have been sabotage from Tensian dissidents, who didn’t know how to use the Will shell effectively. Hope for the latter but plan for the former, I suppose.” He bends down, rooting around in the grass and pocketing something, then gestures cheerfully in the direction the Transvect disappeared.

I watch the ease with which he’s moving again, then glance back in the direction we fell, squinting and shielding my eyes from the heavy droplets that are making it through the canopy above. The brooding clouds aren’t enough to hide the devastation our path down carved, describing an almost perfect tunnel of destruction through the foliage. Several heavy branches are hanging like broken limbs; one tree in particular has snapped at the trunk, its upper half almost at right angles as it rests awkwardly against its neighbour.

It’s not a small tree, either.

I shiver, then hurry to catch up.

We push our way through dense walls of damp, raking bracken for a time. Ulciscor’s clearing of the way ahead, and the sullen chittering of the forest, are the only sounds competing with wind and rain. I’m sodden within minutes, tunic clinging, my torn cloak doing little to fend off the chill. We eventually spot smoke billowing above the treetops ahead, and alter our trajectory.

I’m not sure for how long we trudge on after that. Ten minutes? Twenty? Neither of us speak, all our energy spent on pressing forward. We move slowly. Everything aches. Despite initial appearances, I can tell Ulciscor is tired too. His eyes are still bathed in black. He’s using Will just to keep going.

We eventually stumble upon the Transvect’s path, recognisable both by the massive, obliterated corridor of forest, and the flaming debris that still burns in its wake. The hiss and crackle of the smouldering Transvect fills the air for more than a minute before we reach it.

The wood and stone behemoth is a dying animal in the mud. Some sections still burn fiercely, some are no more than glowing embers. Others still are missing entire pieces, chunks torn away on impact. The rain seems to have prevented most of the surrounding forest from catching. Only a few nearby trees roar their violent, brilliant death throes.

Ulciscor stops a good hundred feet away, his cautioning hand on my arm urging me to do the same. “We’ll circle around,” he murmurs, peering through the rain at the seething wreckage.

There’s no one in sight and I’m exhausted, bruised and thoroughly drenched, but I follow his lead. We cut around the Transvect and begin creeping through the still-standing brush along its sides, toward the front.

“There.” I mutter the word urgently, stooping lower and gesturing. Figures are picking their way along a section near the very front. Four of them, little more than silhouettes against hungry flames.

Ulciscor doesn’t follow suit, watching for a moment, then digging into his pocket and tossing something a distance off to the side. Small, whatever it is. “Stay here.” Taut. Tense. Angry. He grimaces as if he’s trying to shake off the physical shock of everything he’s done tonight, but it’s not working. He sways before managing to steady himself against the thick, gnarled trunk of an old tree, then steps out into cleared space.

I do as he suggests, and stay low.

“What are you doing here?” As weary as I know he is, Ulciscor shows none of it as he calls the question imperiously.

The people ahead flinch and stumble to a halt.

“Ah. We were on board when the Transvect crashed. My name is Sacro.” I can see them more clearly now. All men. Startled by Ulciscor’s appearance. The one who’s talking has dirt and blood smeared across his thin nose and lips. His dirty-blond hair is dishevelled.

“Doing what?”

“Maintenance work. A couple of the Will pylons were coming out of alignment. We figured we’d fix it during the—”

There’s a wet, thudding sound.

Sacro’s head explodes.

It takes a second for anyone to react. Everyone’s frozen. Uncomprehending. Sacro’s body has slumped to the ground by the time the other three men shout and stagger back, half ducking, looking around wildly for whatever has dispatched their friend. There’s violent red viscera painting the Transvect’s façade. I flatten myself hard against the wet ground, every muscle screaming at me to run.

Ulciscor just watches. I understand his calmness only just before the others.

“You killed him.” Dismay, from the pudgy, olive-skinned man on the right. Shock. Not dissimilar to how I’m feeling. I’ve been through some terrible things these past few years, but Birthright means I haven’t seen a dead body for a long time. Not since…

I push the thought away.

“He lied to me. And I’m not in a good mood.” Ulciscor takes a step forward. The other men respond with a scrambling step back. “Let’s start again. Who are…”

There’s a faint zipping, buzzing sound, barely audible above the crackling Transvect and whipping wind. Ulciscor trails off. Lurches. An arrow’s sprouted from the back of his left leg. He half turns, looking down at it, puzzled.

Then he crumples, face-forward, into the churned-up mud.

I wait for him to move, to rise and retaliate despite the shaft sticking out of him. Ulciscor’s a Magnus Quintus. Weakened though he is, an injury like that, no matter how painful, shouldn’t be the only one necessary to fell him.

The remaining three men have scrambled away and taken cover behind various pieces of debris from the crash, gazes flicking from Ulciscor’s prone form to the surrounding forest, seemingly as startled as I.

Finally, the one with the black braided hair breaks the frozen tableau. “Who’s there?”

Only pelting rain and the constant rustling of leaves greets his yell. I peer intently in the direction from which the arrow came, but no one’s visible.

There’s a tense hush, the men hunkering down behind their cover, unmoving. I stare at Ulciscor’s motionless form, willing him to get up. If I try to help him, I’ll be exposing myself not only to these strangers, but to whoever shot him.

“We should get out of here.” It’s the portly man finally breaking the silence, calling out to his companions from where he’s cowering behind a fallen tree trunk. He’s wide-eyed, still twitching at every sound from the surrounding brush.

His wiry, red-bearded companion, who’s hunkering about ten feet away, issues a fervent agreement, but the final one’s hard gaze doesn’t leave Ulciscor. “Not yet. He killed Sacro.” His hand strays to his side, and I spot a sheathe on his belt.

“Don’t, Helmfrid. He’s at least a Sextus. They’ll hunt us to the ends of the earth.”

Helmfrid ignores the warning. He stands, releases a held breath as no arrows fly. There’s a pause, then the other two reluctantly scramble to their feet as well. Still nothing.

Helmfrid takes a step toward Ulciscor, steel glinting in his hand now.

Ah, vek.